Two decades of healthy growth, followed by four to eight decades of slow-motion physical and mental collapse—that’s life, for most of us, despite the efforts of various deluded cranks and tech billionaires. Time spares nothing, and seems particularly to have it out for our faces, paying just as much attention to skin-level deformations (worry-lines, wrinkles, tumorous outgrowths) as it does to the large-scale hollowings and saggings which, over time, change the actual shape of our faces. Continue reading Why Is My Face Changing Shape as I Get Older?→

Contrary to the popular historical narrative, the Union’s effort to rein in the Confederacy and end the secessionist military rebellion now known as the Civil War was incomplete upon the iconic April 9, 1865, surrender of Robert E. Lee at a Virginia courthouse in Appomattox. While ending the conflict in Virginia, the legendary courthouse meeting between Lee and Union General Ulysses S. Grant prompted a series of subsequent surrenders in numerous Southern states and Western territories over the following months. On June 23, a full two-and-a-half months after Appomattox, the war finally came to its conclusion at the Doaksville settlement in present-day Oklahoma with the surrender of Stand Watie, the last Confederate general to lay down his arms. Continue reading The Part of the Trail of Tears Narrative No One Told You About→

Nissan’s current electric car lineup revolves almost exclusively around the Leaf, but it’s ready to diversify its selection. The company’s European design chief Mamoru Aoki has revealed to Autocar that a production version of the IMx concept SUV (above) will arrive sometime in “a few years.” It’s not certain how much the crossover EV would change, but it’s reasonable to presume that Nissan would want to keep the IMx’s performance. The concept promised 435HP and a 380-mile range, giving Tesla’s Model X a run for its money in some cases.

Airliners are growing ever bigger to haul more people per flight, which means they need appropriately massive engines — and GE Aviation is happy to oblige. It recently conducted the first test flight of the GE9X, widely billed as the world’s largest jet engine. It’s easy to believe the claim from a glimpse (it’s as wide as a Boeing 737), but the specs back it up as well: it has a whopping 11.2ft diameter front fan that, combined with carbon fiber blades, a next-gen high-pressure compressor and a new combustor, puts out over 100,000 pounds of thrust. For comparison, some of the earliest GE90 engines aboard Boeing 777s kicked out ‘just’ 74,000 pounds.